1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to the field of smart cards for conducting financial transactions. More particularly, the present invention relates to a smart card that can acquire information regarding a customer's transactions and establish a system automated task for assisting in such financial transactions.
2. Description of Related Art
Credit cards, debit cards, and automatic teller machine cards are widely used by consumers around the world to access, transfer and spend money. These cards make use of a magnetic strip disposed on the back of the card which is encoded with information about the cardholder and the account or accounts accessed by the card. Terminals, which may be automatic teller machines (ATMs) or merchant terminals at a place of business or point of sale, are used to read the coded information on the card and access the cardholder's account to complete a financial transaction.
Besides the well known credit and debit cards, stored value cards are becoming increasingly popular. A stored value card is a card that is purchased or established for a specific monetary amount. That monetary amount is stored as the value of the card. When the cardholder desires to use the stored value card to purchase goods or services, the card is presented at the point of sale and the cost of the goods or services purchased is deducted from the value of the card.
The cardholder may continue to use the stored value card in this manner until all the value has been removed from the card. The card may then be discarded user of the care may provide a method for replenishing the value of the card. Such cards are commonly used today as a means for paying subway fare and making phone calls.
The development of such convenient financial instruments has also produced "smart cards." Rather than employing information encoded on a magnetic strip, smart cards incorporate a microprocessor which is embedded in the card and can interact with the ATM or merchant terminal to provide information about the cardholder or the cardholder's account, transaction authorization, or other information. Various smart card designs and applications are described in the following U.S. Patents which are incorporated herein by reference: U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,766,293 (Boston); U.S. Pat. No. 4,868,376 (Lessin et al.); and U.S. Pat. No. 4,874,935 (Younger).
Advanced smart cards, called very smart cards, may even include a battery, a keypad and an LCD display on the face of the card. However, due to the expense of such advanced cards, typical smart cards have no keypad or display and look like other plastic credit cards.
Smart cards can be designed to operate as stored value cards, credit cards, debit cards, ATM cards, calling cards, etc. A smart card may also be designed to perform any combination of these various functions. However, the multiplicity of capabilities offered by smart cards could result in customer frustration resulting from the vast array of choices available each time a smart card is placed in a smart card reader. For example, use of a smart card at a Citibank ATM machine might permit a customer to deposit money, to withdraw money, to exchange currency, to view a customer's balance, to transfer money between the customer's checking and savings accounts, to purchase and/or sell stocks, etc. A customer wishing to transact only a single type of transaction might encounter a series of menus offering the various financial transaction options available to the customer. A transaction, initially perceived by the consumer to be seemingly a quick and efficient exchange, becomes a test of endurance between the customer and the machine as the customer windows down the choice available by selecting an option at each of several menus.
Thus, there is a need for a smart card that offers enhanced convenience when assisting a customer in executing a transaction. There is also a need for a smart card that can acquire information regarding a consumer's transactions and establish a system automated task for carrying out such financial transactions. Such a smart card has not been available in the prior art.